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Vibration testing is often carried out for automotive components to meet guidelines based on their operational environments. This is an iterative process wherein design changes may need to be made depending on an intermediate model’s dynamic behavior. Predicting the behavior based on modifications in boundary conditions of a well-defined numerical model imparts practical insights to the component’s responses. To this end, application of a general method using experimental free-free condition frequency response functions of a structure is discussed in the presented work. The procedure is shown to be useful for prediction of responses when kinematic boundary conditions are applied, without the need for an actual measurement. This approach is outlined in the paper and is applied to datasets where dynamic modifications are made at multiple boundary nodes.

The prime factor which influences noise and vibrations of electro-mechanical drives is wear at the components. This paper discusses the numerical methods developed for abrasion, vibration calculations and the coupling between wear and Noise Vibration and Harshness (NVH) models of the drive unit. The vibration domain model, initially, focuses on the calculations of mechanical excitations at the gear shafts which are generated via a nonlinear dynamic model. Furthermore, the bearings are studied for the influences on their stiffness and eventually their impact on the harmonics of the drivetrain. Later, free and forced vibrations of the complete drivetrain are simulated via a steady-state dynamic model. Consequently, the paper concentrates on the abrasion calculations at the gears. Wear is a complex process and understanding it is essential for determining the vibro-acoustics characteristics.

Acoustics and vibrations are amongst the foremost indicators in perceiving the quality of drive units. Analyzing these factors is vital for improve the performances of electro-mechanical systems. This paper deals with the study of vibro-acoustic behavior concerning the drivetrain components using system modeling and Finite Element calculations. A generic simulation methodology within system modeling is proposed enabling the vibro-acoustic simulation of electro-mechanical drivetrains. Excitations for these systems mostly arise from the electric motor and mechanical gears. The paper initially depicts the system model for gear whining considering the associated nonlinearities of the mesh. The results obtained from the gear mesh submodel, together with the excitations resulting from the motor, aid in the comprehension of the forces at the bearings and of the vibrations at the housings.

The conventional measurements to describe the photometric quality of headlamps usually only comprise the luminous flux and the illuminance (resp. the luminous intensity) in several measuring points given by Type Approval Legislation. Practically, these photometric measurements do not describe the visual impression of a headlamp light distribution sufficiently, neither in lab nor in real street geometry. With the clear outer lens headlamps introduced recently, filament images are projected directly onto the screens or streets, thus giving new impulses to research. Starting from the established photometric practice, other types of measurements and physiological fundamentals will be discussed. The basic tools to make physical measurement and physiological impression comparable, e.g. in terms of homogeneity, are shown.

In order to prevent injuries due to automatic functions like express- and comfort-opening/closing of power operated window-lift and sunroof systems, mechanisms for detecting obstacles have to be established. The main related regulations are the 74/60/ECC and the FMVSS 118. In this paper we present a unified approach for smart actuators that bases on monitoring the rotational speed of the armature. The advantages have been worked out with the aid of system simulation and proven with tests under realistic and extreme scenarios. The presented results are mainly focused on a sunroof project, which is upcoming for an European car platform in 2001 and is specified to fulfill both regulations simultaneously.

Since the brake colloquium in 2004 the role of climatic conditions and their relations to noise occurrence, sound pressure level and friction coefficient level is widely discussed in the US and European working groups on brake noise. A systematic study has been started to investigate the influence of relative humidity, absolute humidity and temperature on brake noise and the corresponding friction coefficient level. In this study an enormous effort was taken to keep the influences of the brake parameters, e.g. lining material, Eigenfrequencies and dimensions of the different components as small as possible to investigate the climatic influence only. Strategic humidity and temperature levels were tested according to the Mollier-Entropy-Enthalpy-Diagram which are corresponding to the seasons in the various international regions. A regression analysis evaluates the correlation and the influence of each parameter to noise and friction coefficient level.

Secondary air injection after cold start gives two effects for reduced exhaust emissions: An exothermic reaction at the hot exhaust valves occurs, which increases the temperature of the exhaust gas. It gives sufficient air to the catalyst during the cold start fuel enrichment that is necessary to prevent driveability problems. Handicaps for the wide use of air injection include space constraints, weight and price. An electrical air blower was choosen to best satisfy all these requirements. The development steps are described. The result is a three stage radialblower with extremly high revolutions of about 18000 rpm. The system configuration and the outcome are demonstrated on the new C-Class of Mercedes-Benz. The results show emission reductions higher than 50 %, while also satisfying the development goals of noise, volume, weight and cost requirements.

Passenger car DI Diesel engines need a flexible fuel injection system. Bosch develops a common rail system for this purpose. Besides variation of fuel quantity and start of injection, it permits to choosing freely injection pressure inthe rangeof 150 to 1400 barand injecting fuel in several portions. These new means will contribute to further improvements of DI engines concerning noise, exhaust emissions and engine torque.

All networking systems proposed for the automobile are serial in nature. Most of these systems are also multimaster. A requirement common to all of these systems is the ability to separate framing information from data. This is achieved by some form of code violation for the framing bits which violates the code form for standard data bits. In the Manchester and PWM bit representations this code violation can be signalled within a single bit, NRZ requires more bits. The concept of code violation is also used for signalling errors within a message frame. Clock tolerance is dependent on the length of time over which synchronisation between the serial bit stream and receiving circuitry must be maintained. With a given physical bus line bandwidth, the transport capacity of a protocol is a function of the number of time slots needed to transfer a given number of data bytes.

Aerodynamic styling is playing an increasing role in the design of today's passenger cars. The profile sections of the frontends of cars imply that the available installation space for the headlamps - particularly its overall depth and height is decreased in size. New types of headlamps had to be developed. One result of extensive investigations are stepped reflectors with up to six paraboloids with different focal lengths arranged around the same focal point. This type of reflector (called homofocular reflector) cannot be formed from sheet steel but from plastic by injection molding. Depending on thermal, mechanical and geometric boundary conditions three different reflector materials can be used: lacquered thermosets, unlacquered thermoplastics by one or two material injection moldings. Similar to sheet steel the use of glass lenses reduces considerably the freedom of the designer. This disadvantage of offset by the use of plastic lenses.

The SAE J2716 SENT (Single Edge Nibble Transmission) Protocol has entered production with a number of announced products. The SENT protocol is a point-to-point scheme for transmitting signal values from a sensor to a controller. It is intended to allow for high resolution data transmission with a lower system cost than available serial data solution. The SAE SENT Task Force has developed a number of enhancements and clarifications to the original specification which are summarized in this paper.

A closure system for automotive security and driver comfort has been developed. The system combines a passive entry system and an electronic door latch system. The passive entry system utilises a single chip transponder for vehicle immobilisation, passive entry and remote control functionality. The form factor free transponder enables the integration into a key fob or a smart card. The system can be activated by either pulling the door handle or by using a push button transponder. Due to the inductive coupling between the transponder and the vehicle mounted antennas, the vehicle door or trunk opens on successful verification as if there were no locks. Additionally, inside the vehicle, the transponder can be used as a far range immobiliser. The electronic door latch system utilises electronically controlled latches.

This paper will describe the procedures that will enhance the possibilities of qualitative evaluation of headlamp light distributions. A basis will be the description of a light distribution coming only from reflector geometries, i.e. headlamps with clear outer lens design. Further steps of evaluation, as visualization and homogeneity analysis become more and more important for a headlamp evaluation. The recently developed tools can support both the headlamp manufacturer and the car manufacturer in finding a common understanding in headlamp performance of a projected car at a very early stage of development.

A new high-performance interchip interface, called Serial WireRing, is introduced. It combines technically mature and established methods, whereby Serial WireRing provides a simple, robust and very inexpensive solution to replace the Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI). Serial WireRing uses a daisy chain ring topology, realized by unidirectional point-to-point connections from device to device. Serial WireRing is realized by a simple “wire ring” with CMOS, LVDS, optical or any other suitable signaling, even mixed. Therefore it has a very low pin count. In order to minimize the latency each slave transmits the data that it receives with 1 bit delay only. In order to avoid clock/data skew, the serial data and clock are merged into one bitstream. A corresponding clock is extracted at each receiver by a clock and data recovery circuit, driven by a simple internal oscillator.